He asserts that policymakers must
develop better measures of the global services economy.

“Data that do not reflect
the world in which we live increase the chances for
errors in decisionmaking,” he says.

“The Best of All
Worlds: Globalizing the Knowledge Economy”—the
2006 annual report essay—contends that a technology
revolution that makes access to information cheaper
and more democratic has sped up globalization and touched
nearly every part of the world.

According to the essay’s
authors, Senior Vice President and Chief Economist W.
Michael Cox and economics writer Richard Alm, this democratizing
of knowledge is increasing productivity around the world,
lowering costs and raising living standards “in
ways unimaginable just a few years ago.”